Tag: Love

Is it the “radical amazement” of Heschl trying to explain the awesome mystery of the transcendent Divine Presence?

Is it the fear and trembling of judgment, like Adam when he heard the kol of G-d who asked: “Ayekah? Where are You?”

Sometimes we need a Malchyuot, someone else to be in charge. As Sylvia Boorstein said (at our recent retreat): “Cosmos, you drive, today!”

What is this relationship we have with the Divine, and how, in any relationship do two distinct souls join together in one union/ Echad without either compromising or diminishing itself: How does 1 + 1 =1 and still remain 2?

Reflecting this year on the stranger, perhaps we are also the stranger, and have become estranged from ourselves, from others, and from G-d.

I would like to share, briefly, a teaching (with my comments) from Sfat Emet on the very question of our relationship with G-d, which reflects our relationship with ourselves and with others. Sfat Emet suggests this relationship is one of reciprocal love.

As most of you know, Elul, this month of preparation leading up to the The Days of Awe, is also an acronym for Ani L’dodi V’dodi Li – I am to my beloved and my beloved is to me (Song of Songs)

It also emphasizes another vital aspect – that a relationship is a reflection: You and your beloved mirror each other: “Like the face reflected in water, one heart [is reflected] in another” (Proverbs 27:19).

However, Sfat Emet sees the words in a slightly different light. G-d is being the initiator. Creation and redemption were all gifts given to us, not for any of our doing, not out of our merit, but out of love. The same with the revelation at Sinai, Torah and the commandments. And just like in any love relationship, sometimes the recipient is not ready to give back love, to return the gift, to commit, to reciprocate. Instead we built the golden calf and turned away. Elul then becomes a time of repentance, of Tsheuvah, of turning and returning, of turning toward, of cleaning up our messes, of returning to our true essence, of taking the first step to reach out to G-d. Then, with Tsheuvah, and the building of the mishkan, a place for G-d to dwell, we earned G-d’s love, and ready to return the love. Now we can have a reciprocal love relationship.

The mystics say Tsheuvah was created before the world: The cure was there before the disease existed. And today, the mishkan is no longer the external place out there, but rather, your hearts. Rabbi Menachem Mendel says: “Where do we find G-d? Wherever we let G-d in”. In the opening and the breaking of our hearts, we find the Divine.

Sfat Emet ends by saying that we can see Elul as lovers seeking each other, and Tshevah fills us not with fear, but with a yearning to become closer to G-d.

But as the final step of tsheuvah, after our awareness of our problems, and after making amends with others, and re-establishing relationships, why do we have to come before G-d and confess our sins. Doesn’t G-d know everything? Rabbi Balinsky offered this answer: It’s because our words create our consciousness. Our words create our world.

The high holidays are about the consciousness in our relationships. Mindfulness, is heartfulness. Jonathan Sachs writes says that tsheuvah, tzadakah and tefilah are about relationships: Tsheuvah: our relationship with ourself; tzedakah: our relationship with others; and tefillah: our relationship with G-d. And I recently realized that it’s one process: we must clean up our own mess and purifiy our hearts (tsheuvah) so we can reach out and help others (tzedakah), leading to a relationship with G-d (tefillah). Our liturgy says: “Before G-d we will be pure”, or “we will be pure before G-d” On Yom Kippur, G-d purifies us. It is not up to the High Priests. G-d is our Mikveh. Our most intimate relationship.

Daily we say: “YHVH, Hoshiah, Ha Melek yayenyu, byom karenu”: G-d, save us, answer us on the day we call out to you”. Our call today is: Malchyot, G-d, “Purify us, so that we may have hearts of wisdom, from which forth flows generosity, and compassion and kindness, to ourselves and to all beings.

We asked our students for their thoughts on practicing kindness. We are pleased to share some of their essays.

Stop the madness!!! — I want to get off!!!
by Tirtzah Israel

Where’s our compassion for one another? What happened to kindness? Why are we so afraid to acknowledge its need and purpose in everyday life? The power of kindness is here in our world waiting to be accessed as a collective resource, even as a preventive measure to counteract violence.

We are all sickened by the latest wake of mass killings and gun-violence due to bigotry and hatred. Right now the earth seems to be filled with strife and malcontent. I am reminded of the pre-flood portion to the Noach story where in his time the earth was filled with so much corruption that God decided to destroy the earth. In our own time, we live in a society where both politician and gunman present themselves as demigods with the “ultimate” solution for the world that appeals only to the lowest denominator of human existence. They “fan the fires” for violence, divisiveness, power and influence both physically and psychological as a rationale for problem-solving. These people, in my opinion, act out of ignorance, mis-information, mis-education, fear or/and are mentally deranged.

In real-time, the news outlets inundate viewers and readers with the gruesome details of human carnage that both sensationalize and desensitized the suffering of others so much so that we are rendered helpless in our grief. We re-live these traumatic events and are shakened to the very core of our existence, yet too frightened to act as a collective body for the sake humanity.

Sure, there’s a collective, world-wide outpouring of kindness in response to these tragedies. Yes, we are energized in those moments to support one another during the horrific initial emotional realization of raw cruelty. However, no amount of kindness can offset the impact of the trauma perpetrated upon humanity when the outpouring of kindness occurs only in response to specific tragedies. Without these horrific events, we too easily slip back into our self-serving and self protecting mode wishing for safety as we desperately hold-on to our preferred lifestyle. The test for all of us is for us to realize that we are all one people, intimately connected as one race; the human-race. We all belong to one another and we are all responsible for one another as a collective human society. Basically, we all want the same things out of life. We all want to have the reasonable opportunity to be able to reach our potential, to be successful and prosperous, to be safe, happy, healthy, and no one wants to be made to feel “left-out.” We naturally strive towards sharing — and when that doesn’t happen an eruption occurs.

Collectively, we have access to some of the most powerful tools in the world; more powerful than bullets and bombs in the form of love, compassion and kindness. Yes, people we are designed to be kind because we all naturally gravitate towards it. We seek kindness in one another. Yet, it appears at least on the outside, as if we have forgotten or maybe we are ashamed of accessing that which is inherently fulfilling, intimately close and intrinsically healing — Kindness/compassion. These attributes are divinely bestowed upon us by The Creator. They are part of our Universe. In particular, kindness/compassion allows us to fulfill our highest purpose at being a shared and common humanity. Kindness can be stress relieving. Kindness is benevolent; Kindness fulfills our desire to do good and charitable deeds that benefits others. And it begins with each and everyone of us, individually, to activate the kindness within ourselves; to love ourselves and to experience compassion for ourselves that can be shared by others.

If we could imagine our world without strife, without hatred and bigotry then we can actualize it. It’s not impossible. Together, we have the ability and power within us to make this dream a reality. However, we must decide to do this together. We can simply begin by forming prayer networks that pray for the activation of kindness and compassion. We can pray to activate healing the world; and to pray for a shared compassion that ends suffering. It can become a contagious movement, neigborhood by neigborhood, community by community. But, it begins with just one person — visualizing; imagining; and engaging their power to heighten kindness; compassion and love. For the pessimist among us, I say to them I’m not suggesting we all hold hands and sing “kum-bi-ya” around the campfire (although, that’s not a bad thought). No, I referring to a clear sense of responsibilty, and active-state of mindful kindness that honors life.

If we could just stop being so damagingly competitive, stop trying to be “the winner” and “king of the hill” for just a moment, it could create an intutive-moment that allows us to find that balance towards wholeness. We can actually heal the world. It’s within our power to do so because we are all connected to one another whether we like it or not. When you are not healed, I’m not healed. When I’m not healed, you are not healed. But colllectively, we have the ability to end violence in our world and to achieve the wealth of balance by actively participating. We each have the responsibilty. We each have the power. We each can help to turn our world around.

Please don’t be that one person who may be holding out from the rest of us impending us from achieving our goal for harmony. It’s not too late. The world is waiting for the power of your kind prayers with compassion. I thank you for praying with me.

This week’s Torah portion, Kedoshim, is the single Torah portion that not only inspired me to be a rabbi, but recognizes the amazing teaching of Judaism.

When the world was overwhelmed by war, from Mesopotamia to Europe, when communities were pitted one against the other, the Scriptural author of Judaism, rather than enter into the fray of competition, wrote in our magnificent Torah, “Thou shalt love thy fellow as you love yourself.”

That statement itself is most inspiring, but when the rabbis were asked to comment on this Biblical verse, they added, “because your fellow is yourself.” We are all One.